Congrats Boats, nice lathe. Since you bought it from someone that works with this kind of machinery regularly, maybe ask him how he moves it or who he uses. He probably has all the gear to move it, and might know the lift points better than the wrecker driver.

Nice looking tool Boats! Mine is very Similar...it's a 1920 H...H for Hardened bed I was told by logan.And your paint is much nicer than mine...If you can come up with a collet closer in addition to the 3 and 4 jaw chucks you'll Love it! Terry

Here are pictures of the outboard cathead I made for mine. When I bought my lathe it had sat for years and the spindle bearings were dry and noisy. I had to replace the bearings so I had the spindle out of the lathe. It was an easy job to make a new preload nut at that time. I use 3/8-24 set screws with brass tips to adjust center. I have short screws for large diameter barrels and long screws for small diameter barrels. I placed the screw holes in line with the jaws on the 4 jaw chuck. I had to bore the hole in the cover elongated to be able to open it over the extension.

I still have the original nut. If you would like to borrow it to help you make an extended one I would send it to you.

That's perfect Deadeye. Design is like the one on my Atlas just a better fit. Like you I replaced the Hex head screws with Allen head set screws that run down to flush, Have two sets can go to longer ones when running small dia stock. Made a lot of cleaning rods on the Atlas. Steel and Delrin both.

Be a little while before I am ready to make one up, will take you up on the offer when I do. We don't live all that far apart considering I shoot up in the Valley fairly often. Shotguns 8/6 at Shenendale Club next.

I think the best, small, low price lathe that you can get, is a 11" Logan.

They have a 1 3/8 spindle hole and can take barrel blanks to that diameter. it's also easy to get 5C collect closers for them. they have a 2 1/4 x 8 spindle nose, also very common. The spindle is suppoted by ball bearings.

I bought mind used, in 1975 and used it in my business, until I retired. I still use it almost everyday and do 95% of my gun work on it.

The single thing that I didn't like, was the dial. I replaced that with a 3" diameter one.

The Clausing and Sheltons are good lathes but, their variable speed control can cause problems. tooling for the "L" tapers are costly and getting hard to find.

The price on Hardidge lathes, will keep you out of that market, as well as most anything that is classified as a "Tool Room Lathe".

I can't say anything about a Rockwell, I haven't ever found one in the machineshops that I've worked in.

I have worked on South Bends (13" & 16"). They had plain bearing in the ones I work with. I wouldn't recommend them, because of that.

I'm a little surprised non of you guys mentioned a LeBlond lathe. I have a 15x54 LaBlond I acquired some time ago and plan to fully restore it to close to new as possible. It's a model 15C5 (5 HP) and came with a brand new rotory phase converter system (7.5 HP motor & separate control box). The guy I bought it from got it from Tracor Aerospace in Austin where it was shipped from the factory on 3/10/1969. He had it stored in his garage, bought the phase converter but never used the lathe and never installed the phase converter. It reportedly was used to machine aluminum parts for aircraft. It came with a bunch of stuff including: 2 Aloris tool posts & 4 Aloris holders, 3-jaw 8" Buck chuck, 4-jaw 10" Cushman chuck, taper attachment, Hardinge Sjogen speed collet chuck for 5c collets, drawtube type lever action collet closer for 5C collets & various tools. Everything for $900.

I need to clean it up and repaint it. The wife says I can't keep it in the garage so plan to build a workshop for it & other equipment.

Once I get the lathe up & running, next on the list is a good mill. Until then I have a Palmgen 400 lathe milling attachment.

Mac the probably skipped LeBlonds because I was looking for small. You are going to add a building for it, the Logan has to fit my shop !!

Talk about big my Cousin owns a machine shop, does a lot of work for small ship yards. He bought a 36 foot lathe out of the Navy Yard surplus. Has a seat on the saddle so the operator can ride. Had to put in a metal building to house it. Propeller shaft work keeps it busy.

I'm a little surprised non of you guys mentioned a LeBlond lathe. I have a 15x54 LaBlond I acquired some time ago and plan to fully restore it to close to new as possible. It's a model 15C5 (5 HP) and came with a brand new rotory phase converter system (7.5 HP motor & separate control box). The guy I bought it from got it from Tracor Aerospace in Austin where it was shipped from the factory on 3/10/1969. He had it stored in his garage, bought the phase converter but never used the lathe and never installed the phase converter. It reportedly was used to machine aluminum parts for aircraft. It came with a bunch of stuff including: 2 Aloris tool posts & 4 Aloris holders, 3-jaw 8" Buck chuck, 4-jaw 10" Cushman chuck, taper attachment, Hardinge Sjogen speed collet chuck for 5c collets, drawtube type lever action collet closer for 5C collets & various tools. Everything for $900.

I need to clean it up and repaint it. The wife says I can't keep it in the garage so plan to build a workshop for it & other equipment.

Once I get the lathe up & running, next on the list is a good mill. Until then I have a Palmgen 400 lathe milling attachment.

Wayne

Sounds like a heck of a good deal you got! That's a big boy lathe though!

Sounds like a heck of a good deal you got! That's a big boy lathe though!Terry

I've used several South Bend's while taking NRA gunsmithing classes &, as I remember, they're not a lot bigger. My LeBlond footprint is 8' 2" x 24". I had planned to keep it in our 2-car garage but that got nixed. BTW, LeBlond also made smaller lathes & of course some huge ones.

"Bigger is almost always better if you have the space. The heavier the machine the less torque and vibration. "

Not always. Larger lathes are great for drive shafts, etc. However, larger throwlathes run out of rpm rather soon. This is especially true if one is using carbideinserts that really like to work in a given sfm range.

Larger lathes are almost always easier to use, just because of the extra size and mass. handles and dials are much nicer and more usefull.

But, they are more expensive, harder to move and most have head stocks that are to long for barrel work, w/o using a steady rest on the bed. I only do barrel work (other than polishing) in the lathe spindle, indicated at both ends of the headstock.

A good 17" lathe will cost $3000 - 4000. Good 14 - 15" lathes $2000 - 3000. You can go a lot higher than that, depending on the make, condition and tooling.

Most people starting out, doing their own barrel work, don't want to invest that much. The 11" Logans will do any gunsmithing work for $600 - 1000, bought on Craigs list or even dealers. The ability to use 5C collets, gives them a big advantage over many small lathes.

I bought mine used, in 1976 and it continues to do it's job, 41 years later. Mine also has a bed turret, that also helps it's usefulness. You can add all kinds of things to them.

There are better (usually much more expensive) lathes in the 14" range and under but, none cheaper and more reliable.

Logan's home and in my shop. Jacked it up put heavy casters under each end and rolled it up ramps onto my 1000 lb capacity Utility Trailer. Not that hard to do, just can't afford mistakes with that kind of load. Want to see how to roll big stuff look at my post , off topic chatter

Fellow that restored it never used it, and never set up the drive belts properly. Lot of under the cabinet work adjusting, think I have it about right now. Only mechanical issue I can find, clutch is not working, Half nut engages fine, this lathe has a clutch to engage the feed independent of the half nut, and slips should the carriage hit something. Logan manual came with it has exploded drawings of the saddle and clutch. On line couple of good Utube videos on how to set up and adjust the clutch. Tackle that this weekend.

It's a whole lot more lathe than my 12 inch Atlas, which is on my trailer now going to my son's shop tomorrow.

One Lathe that I got and has proved to be a good investment is a older Wood Lathe. Put a small 3 Jaw Chuck on it and now I can sand and polish parts without worrying about grit getting on my good lathe. Handy for polishing barrels also!